Expansion meeting demand for more and faster service: CPR

Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) says it will meet burgeoning demand for more and faster intermodal freight service with the completion of a CDN $26 million capacity increase at its Vaughan Intermodal Facility in the northwestern Greater Toronto Area, making it the largest such rail-truck terminal in Canada.

“This project was designed to increase capacity and expedite the flow of traffic through our most important intermodal terminal in Canada’s largest intermodal marketplace. It is a multi-pronged plan that couples strategic capital investment with a major redesign of our intermodal train schedules, and we’ve done it with the input and cooperation of our customers,” said Ed Dodge, executive vice-president and chief operating officer of the CPR.

The Vaughan expansion boosts capacity by 70 per cent to 400,000 container and trailer handlings annually. It will also decrease truck turnaround time at the terminal to less than 35 minutes.

The largest of 22 such terminals, the Vaughan Intermodal Facility has land space available for further expansion to almost 700,000 handlings a year.

CPR intermodal traffic has grown faster than any other business segment and is now the railway’s largest revenue earner, generating 23 per cent of total revenue. The 50th anniversary of intermodal service on the CPR will be marked next year.